


Once upon a dream...

by DictionaryWrites



Category: Discworld - Terry Pratchett
Genre: Dreams and Nightmares, Drowning, M/M, Near Death Experiences, Secret Relationship, Song Lyrics
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-02-12
Updated: 2019-02-12
Packaged: 2019-10-26 15:17:37
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 574
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17748332
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/DictionaryWrites/pseuds/DictionaryWrites
Summary: He wasn’t breathing.Nor was Vetinari.





	Once upon a dream...

**Author's Note:**

> [Recommended listening.](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8waJ7W3QcJc)

The night was black as pitch, and moonlight lit the black pastures, making silhouettes the blades of grass and creating a glowing carpet if damask white, shifting in the wind, although there was no wind. The night was still, and breezeless. There was no air here at all, he could almost believe.

The music was eerie, and he heard it come from nowhere at all, or perhaps everywhere, thrumming up from the very ground beneath his feet and seeping, cool and all-encompassing, into his very bones.

He wasn’t breathing.

Nor was Vetinari.

_I know you, I walked with you once upon a dream_

Vetinari was moving slowly, and perhaps there was a crowd, more people, other people dancing, but Drumknott didn’t know them, didn’t _care_ : Vetinari’s hand raised to meet his own, palm-to-palm, and they slowly circled one another, taken along by the slow rhythm of the music.

His mouth was dry.

Vetinari’s gaze bored into his, a shine of icy blue in the colourless night.

_I know you, that look in your eyes is so familiar a gleam_

His fingers were cold, and Drumknott knew that was wrong, because Vetinari’s hands were always warm, but it didn’t matter: Vetinari pulled Drumknott's body flush against his own, their chests against one another, no air between them. Vetinari’s hand was cupping his hip, the other clasping at his hand, and Drumknott’s fingers splayed like spiders’ web on Vetinari’s shoulder, somehow diaphanous and filmy, like they weren’t truly there.

He imagined he could see the ghost of bones beneath Vetinari’s skin, see the shadow of his ribs, his spine, through his black robes.

They danced slowly, around and around in circles.

_And I know it’s true, that visions are seldom all they seem_

The grass was gone now.

They danced on a chessboard, and as their steps moved silently over the checkerboard marble, Drumknott fancied he heard it crumbling, heard the stone hissing as it gave way, and fell down, down, into the dark, into the abyss.

Vetinari looked down at him, his eyes like quicksilver, and Drumknott didn’t care.

_But if I know you, I know what you’ll do  
You’ll love me at once, the way you did once upon a dream_

Vetinari kissed him, and Drumknott was drowning: they were falling slowly downward, Vetinari and Drumknott’s legs entangled, their arms around one another, the world around them too thick to be just air, and Drumknott was drowning.

This was well and good, at the end of it all.

He would rather drown here than elsewhere.

\--

Drumknott coughed, spluttered, and he leaned his head forward, his forehead touching to the Patrician’s shoulder.

This was all he could do, in front of a crowd like this: this was all he could do, all he could ask for, all that remained in the plausible realm of deniability. Shaking violently and soaked to his skin, he coughed, gagged, spat sea water over his own lap, and the Patrician’s hand, strong, warm, was gripping so tightly at the side of his shoulder he thought he would crumble.

“I thought you were dead,” he said, so quietly no one but Drumknott could hear him. Drumknott’s chest ached, and he knew the compressions had left bruises.

“I think I was,” Drumknott said softly, although speaking made his ragged throat cry out in agony, and he ached with the loss as Vetinari pulled away, and let the Watch’s Igor tend to him.

**Author's Note:**

> Hit me up [on Dreamwidth](https://dictionarywrites.dreamwidth.org/2287.html). Requests always open.
> 
> I run a [Discworld Comm](https://onthedisc.dreamwidth.org/), and there's also [a Discord right here.](https://discord.gg/b8Z3ThH)


End file.
